How can I be certain I am saved? How can a person be sure he or she is a Christian, is truly born again, is a child of God, is heading for heaven?
Some theologians will tell you that we can’t ever be assured of our salvation in this life. That we have to just trust in God and do our best to follow the example of Jesus Christ. But the Bible is much more encouraging. The Bible says that we CAN know for certain that we are saved. But how?
If you’ve been going to any church for a while then you probably already know the answer. I certainly did. Very early on as a Christian I learned the words of John 3:16
16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
I knew that because I believed in Jesus I was sure not to die but to receive God’s gift of eternal life. I learned by heart the words of Jesus in John 6.
35 Then Jesus declared, ‘I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. … 37 All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. … 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. 40 For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.’
I knew that I had come to Jesus and believed in Him and He would never drive me away. I knew that I was saved and could never be lost again, because I looked to the Son and believed in Him and that He would never lose me and would definitely raise me to life at the last day. I was certain that I was saved!
I’d been a Christian for about three years and gone away to university when I discovered that maybe that assurance of salvation was misplaced. That perhaps my salvation wasn’t as certain as I had believed. I learned this at a very sound and respectable Christian Union Saturday evening Bible Reading, from Martin Goldsmith, Principal of All Nations missionary training college. What he said was this. If we think that our salvation is guaranteed just because we believe the right doctrines – think again! If we think we can be sure we are saved because we have “saving faith”, think again, and listen to these words of the apostle John.
1 John 3 14 We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love each other. Anyone who does not love remains in death.
How can we be sure we are saved? Because we love our brothers. Not because of what we say we believe – but because we love other Christians! It’s not our beliefs which are the test – but our love! This is embarrassing. This is challenging. This is the kind of verse we would like to ignore – and if it were just that one verse we might be able to ignore it. But John makes the same point three times in the reading we just heard. He is very clear. If you aren’t loving your fellow Christians, you don’t have eternal life!
14 We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love each other. Anyone who does not love remains in death. 15 Anyone who hates a brother or sister is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life residing in him.
10 This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: anyone who does not do what is right is not God’s child, nor is anyone who does not love their brother and sister.
23 And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us.
It’s not just about faith. We should have faith AND love. We are saved by faith alone but saving faith is never alone! It is ALWAYS faith expressed in love. John says it again in chapter four in some memorable verses which we will think more about next week.
1 John 4 7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
If we are not showing our faith by showing love to other Christians, we don’t really know God at all. A great philosopher once said a very wise thing which very many people would agree with. It was Snoopy who said “I love humanity. It’s people I can’t stand!” It is easy to love – in abstract, in theory. What is difficult is to show true love in concrete ways, in practice, in everyday life, with real people.
God is easy to love. God never does anything wrong. God never does anything to hurt us or let us down. We may sometimes feel that God has hurt us or let us down but that’s only our wrong understanding. God is completely righteous and holy and just. God never does anything wrong – so God is easy to love.
If only people were like that! But people aren’t like that! People say things that upset us. People do things that hurt us. By the things that they do and by the things they don’t do when they should, people let us down time and time again. Sometimes it happens by accident or because they don’t know any better. Sometimes it’s their deliberate choice. Sometimes it’s just because they are human and human beings mess up – that’s human nature. But time and time again people hurt us and let us down – so people are difficult to love. Perhaps things have happened to you this week and so you know exactly what I mean. People can be difficult to love! But John says we can’t claim that we love God if we don’t show it by loving other Christians. And the kind of love God expects from us is no easy task. It is very demanding and costly. Most of us know John 3:16 off by heart. We ought to learn 1 John 3:16 off by heart as well –
1 John 3 16 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.
Christ’s sacrifice on the cross for us is the standard and supreme example of the kind of love we should show to other Christians. Not just love when it suits us, love when we can spare the time, but love which costs, love which pays the ultimate price! Think of how much it cost Christ to die for us. How much does it really cost us to live for him? Laying down our lives not just for God but for our brothers.
God’s kind of love is costly but at the same time it is very practical and down to earth!
1 John 3 16 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. 17 If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? 18 Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.
True love is not feelings but actions. It shows itself in practical ways, in simple acts of kindness and generosity and helpfulness. True love means forgiving other people when they don’t apologise and don’t even realise they have done anything wrong. It means patience. It means turning the other cheek and going the extra mile. True love is becoming a servant and washing each other’s feet and taking on the unpleasant and unrewarding jobs so that nobody else will have to do them.
We thought last week about how much God loves us. How God has lavished his love upon us. God loves us so much that he has made us to be his children. How God in his immeasurable love God has forgiven our sins and given us eternal life. God lives within us! He gives us victory and he answers our prayers. And God has given us the happy certainty of heaven and seeing him face to face in glory forever. Above all last week we were reminded that we know just how much God loves us because Jesus has died for us!
God loves us so much – Christ’s death on the cross for us proves that. And there is the first reason why Christians should love one another. That is our grateful joyful response to God’s amazing love for us. We believe in Jesus Christ and we are trusting in His death to pay the penalty for our sin so that we can share His resurrection life. And we can be certain that we are saved, because not only do we believe the gospel but we also love our brothers and sisters in Christ.
But John also gives us a second motive to love our brothers and sisters at a number of places is this letter. We have read it before and we will read it again. God commands it!
1 John 3 23 And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us.
Jesus only gave his disciples one new commandment to add to the Law of Moses. Only one – so we can deduce that this is a very important command indeed. It was not a commandment to pray, or worship, or read the Bible every day, or avoid a particular kind of sin.
John 13:34-35 Jesus said “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
So we love because Christ commands it. Loving each other is the most important thing we can do to show our Christian faith.
And for a third motivation, we love because this love for one another is our witness to the world! Showing the difference Jesus makes. Being the Light of the World. In His New Commandment Christ spells out exactly how our Christian lifestyle will be a witness to the watching world. And it is this. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.
It was my favourite of the Early Church Fathers, Tertullian of Carthage, who wrote early in the Third Century about the impact the growing church was having in the world. He commented on how the world around noticed the difference between the attitudes of the Christians and the attitudes of the pagans.
“‘Look,’ they say, ‘how they [Christians] love one another’ (for they themselves hate one another); ‘and how they are ready to die for each other’ (for they themselves are readier to kill each other).”
So we should love each other as our response to God’s love for us. We should love each other because Jesus commands it. And we should love each other because that is the way that and family and neighbours and friends and strangers will know we are Christians.
THIS is how we can be certain we are saved
10 This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: anyone who does not do what is right is not God’s child, nor is anyone who does not love their brother and sister.
14 We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love each other. Anyone who does not love remains in death.
